His Unblemished Mind
by Seren Castor
Summary: "I'm erasing you and I'm happy!" yells John Watson to the retreating form of Sherlock Holmes, who rounds a corner and disappears, leaving John alone on the crowded city pavement. (Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind AU)
1. 29 January

**Summary**: "I'm erasing you and I'm happy!"yells John Watson to the retreating form of Sherlock Holmes, who rounds a corner and disappears, leaving John alone on the crowded city pavement.

* * *

**His Unblemished Mind  
By Seren Castor**

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**Chapter 1: 29 January**

_"Thy oaths I quit, thy memory resign; _  
_Forget, renounce me, hate whate'er was mine_  
_Fair eyes, and tempting looks (which yet I view!)_  
_Long lov'd, ador'd ideas, all adieu!"_ – Alexander Pope, "Eloisa to Abelard"

He awoke with a violent headache and a foggy memory. Had he gone out drinking last night? It took a few minutes to get acclimated to being awake. The blinds were down, so not too much light was flooding in.

He turned over to kiss Mary on the cheek before getting up, but curiously she was absent. Shrugging, he got out of bed clumsily and contemplated getting ready for the day.

With toothbrush in mouth, he opened his laptop screen and typed in the address to his blog. His usual routine.

Only two posts in past six months. One a year ago (_Nothing ever happens to me_) and one yesterday (_Living with Mary is great, thanks for asking great empty web_).

_Why do I bother to check this for comments if I never post anything in the first place?_ he thought as he trudged his way back to the bathroom mirror, pausing a little while longer than usual after spitting to examine the bags under his eyes and the traces of wrinkles forming by his brow. More than he remembered.

* * *

He sat on the tube waiting for his stop, although it seemed a little ridiculous to him where he was going.

"No, Sarah…" pause for cough, "Seems I've come down with a terrible cold. Would endanger patients if I came in. Find someone to cover me for today? Thanks."

So here he was on the tube skiving off of work and he didn't even have a book to read or anything to do. That morning he stood on the platform in front of his usual train, right up until the doors closed and it barreled away. It was one of those days where you needed to run away from everything that made you a responsible adult, so he decided give Mike Stamford a ring and have a pint. At 10 in the morning.

He got on the train to Saint's Paul's Station just as the doors were closing, sat down, and mindfully avoided eye contact with the person sitting across from him. He fiddled with his cane as he tried to keep his mind occupied with thoughts of Mary and fabricated memories from the night before.

Until, "Afghanistan or Iraq?"

John looked up and replied, "Pardon?"

"Afghanistan or Iraq" asked the man again, crossing his legs and maintaining steady and un-blinking eye contact.

"Afghanistan… how did..?"

"The same way I can tell you're an army doctor who's been working as a civilian doctor for about a year, and you've got a psychosomatic limp. Perhaps from a real injury, but it's healed by now surely. And on the platform you were standing even though there were benches available, which means you limp when you're walking but forget about it when you stand. So, psychosomatic. I can read your military service by the tan on your wrist. Stops before your arm. Obviously not sun-bathing. Faded considerably. So on tour, someplace hot. Afghanistan or Iraq, but not in the past year. The way you hold yourself, your haircut, and your stance all say military."

"Right…but how did you know I was a doctor?"

"I listened to your phone conversation."

"Ah."

"The name is Sherlock Holmes…"

"Pleasure."

"So as I was saying, I'm in need of a suitable medical examiner to consult with on cases. The one they've been bringing to the crime scenes lately is insufferable. I'm a consulting detective, by the way. The only one in the world, actually. I invented the title."

"I see…. So what the world's only consulting detective doing taking the tube?"

The man didn't answer. Instead he pulled out a notebook and furiously started scribbling, which reminded John that he needed to work on his blog, so he too pulled out a notebook from his jacket pocket and wrote down what he was thinking.

_Strange man approached me on tube. He's still here, but if I turn up dead know it was him._

John chuckled darkly.

"What?" the man across from him inquired.

"Oh, nothing," muttered John, snapping the notebook shut, "Just laughing to myself really."

"So are you available? To consult on cases, I mean."

"I certainly hope that's what you mean."

"What kind of case are you talking about?

"Oh, you know. The exciting kind. Serial killer. Five people dead so far. No apparent connection between the victims. It's like Christmas."

"Bit not good. Mass killing spree like Christmas? A bit indecent."

"And yet you're still here. So what do you say doctor? Want to see a body?"

"I would be lying if I said no-."

He could meet up with Mike any day. Their pint would have to wait until later. Maybe even in the evening.

* * *

_I don't know if I'm meant to be writing this. I'm definitely not a writer, but Ella, my therapist said it would be a good idea to write down some of my thoughts. Usually nothing happens to me, but today something did._

_I met a man on the tube today. He was strange, but also charming in a bizarre way. I can't really describe it (like I said earlier, I'm not much of a writer)._

_Despite his off-putting demeanor he was a brilliant man. He could read my military service from my tan line, down to the location of my tour. And he figured out I was a doctor as well which leads me to my story._

_He said he was a consulting detective. The only one in the world. He asked if I would consult with him on a case. Gruesome stuff. Serial murderer. No link between the victims. For some reason I said yes and we went straight there._

_The crime scene was disturbing but strangely calculated. The man looked at the scene for only a few minutes before he was able to rattle every conceivable detail about the murderer, down to his hair colour and shoe size and where he went to primary school (I exaggerate, but I can't even recall all of the details he spouted out). It was fantastic. He asked me to look over the body too, but everything I had to tell him he already figured out for himself._

_So I guess this is a pretty interesting entry. I haven't posted one in over a year besides yesterday? Strange. Well anyways, that's about it for now. Will keep you posted on any other dangerous adventures._

_Edit: I googled him and he has a website, The Science of Deduction. He's a bit public school, but I agreed to consult on other cases with him. Maybe my life will get little more interesting._

"What's that stupid grin you've gone on your face for?"

"Oh, it's nothing," John said as he set his laptop down on the coffee table.

"You've been grinning like a madman since you got home from work."

"I hadn't noticed," he replied, "Bit of a strange day. Woke up in a funk but met a bizarre man on the tube."

She stopped clinking dishes for a brief second.

"Bizarre man?" she asked, but didn't turn around.


	2. Pieces

John stalks up to his room and throws himself under the duvet—another argument with Sherlock.

_"I'll be upstairs if you need me."_

_"Why would I need you?"_

_"No reason whatsoever."_

He hopes to dream about murdering his flatmate, but instead he dreams of something quite different.

The alarm rings and he wakes up, but he isn't in his bed at 221B anymore. His hands are small and clumsy. He's in his old room back at his parent's house. Harry is still fast asleep in the bed next to his. She always could sleep through anything, even the screaming matches downstairs.

But something isn't right. He almost never wakes up from his alarm clock. Usually their mother would come and wake them by gently shaking their shoulders. She always thought that you should wake up to someone you loved.

Minutes pass but he still can't hear that familiar sound of his mother's slippered feet on the carpeted stairs.

He slides out of bed and crosses the hardwood floor, careful not to wake Harry with the creaking boards. The floor is freezing against his bare toes. He walks down the stairs. His mother is there. She doesn't move.

An hour later they are at the hospital. Harry is awake now, sitting next to him and holding his hand. She is crying, but all he can think about is the fact that he forgot his shoes at home. His feet don't forget the cold.

The scene plays out infinitely in his dream. There, they always wait for the bad news, but it never comes. In actuality, the news did come. In the dream they wait for hours, but in real life they only wait for five minutes. Their mother was already dead by the time the medics come to the house.

This time, however, the dream diverges slightly from its usual trajectory. This time, there is another character sitting across from him. No, not his father. Their father never came to the hospital and never does, not even here.

The figure across from him has dark curls and silver blue eyes. While Harry cries on John's shoulder the boy looks at him. He opens his mouth to say something but no sound comes out.

John wakes up, trying to piece together the missing dialogue. Sherlock plays his violin downstairs. Something sad.

**Chapter 2: Pieces**

Straight to voicemail.

"This is Sherlock Holmes. Leave a message, and please-don't be boring."

"This is the hundredth time I've called you Sherlock. Quit being such a child and pick up," John Watson said as he stabbed the end button on his mobile.

"John, isn't it a little late for you to still be up? Don't you have to work at the surgery tomorrow.?"

He sighed. "I know, Mary. It's just…well you know he is."

"I'm sure he'll turn up. He's probably just cross with you."

It had been one week since John had moved out of 221B Baker Street. He was dating again, and things were getting more serious than they had been in the past. Mary Morstan. He was thinking of settling down with this one. They had even decided to move in together. Sherlock wasn't happy.

The first couple of days had been the calm before the storm. John barely heard from Sherlock until the third day. He received an alarming text message.

_Good-bye, John. – SH_

John was so troubled that he had been calling Sherlock non-stop since that text. What was it? On Wednesday? Well, now it was Sunday and he had heard not even a whisper from Sherlock Holmes.

"He could be in a ditch. He could have gone on a drug frenzy. Gotten himself killed by a serial murderer. Jesus."

"Go to sleep, John."

But he couldn't go to sleep. It had been too long. He was legitimately worried. In the middle of the night he got out of bed, put on his clothes, and marched to 221B in hopes of uncovering the reason for his partner's persistent silence.

The new flat wasn't far from his old one, but the walk still seemed to take a long time. And it was cold. Insufferably cold. Wasn't it supposed to be June? Still, this was important. He hoped Mary wouldn't wake up and worry where he'd gone so he shot her a text explaining. She was a heavy sleeper, but you never knew about these things.

221B. It still felt like home even though he was all moved out. The lights upstairs were off. Unusual. Sherlock was frequently awake at this hour, pacing about the apartment and screeching away at the violin.

He still had a key so he let himself in. No one home. It looked almost the same as when he left a week ago, except every trace of a normal human living there had been erased. There were no dishes anywhere. Every inch of counter space was covered with lab equipment and there were files scattered all over the floor. So Sherlock was back to his old ways. At least he knew he wasn't lying in here dead or something.

He left the flat, feeling silly for getting up in the middle of the night.

* * *

Sherlock Holmes paced about the flat manically, hands folded together beneath his chin, trying to figure out the answer to his little problem.

For once he had missed something. This morning he awoke with a disturbingly potent headache wearing pajamas he did not remember in his own bed, which he could not remember sleeping on in months. He usually passed out on the sofa most nights. The nights he slept, anyway. Additionally, when looking in the mirror in the morning he noticed the remnants of two small blue dots on either side of his temple, drawn on with a felt-tip marker.

He knew it had been a while since he had been on any hard drugs, but he was worried that maybe he had had a bad night. So bad he could not remember anything about it.

That morning he awoke to a flat in shambles. Lab equipment littered the kitchen table, an experiment he couldn't recall.

And then there was that file on his desk. The very deliberately-placed file.

"What is wrong with me…" he muttered to the skull as he continued to pace about.

And then there were the hairs. Short blond and gray hairs of a non-smoking male person scattered about in various high traffic arrears in the flat. On the couch. In the kitchen. How did they get in the kitchen? In the bathroom. Everywhere in the bathroom. He couldn't remember any blond-haired men ever setting foot in the flat.

So what the evidence was telling him was that he had made a "friend" last night and invited him over to the flat. Either that, or he was visited by a middle-aged burglar who not only stole nothing, but also roamed about the flat and used the bathroom as though he lived there. A bit unlikely. So he had met someone yesterday. But how? And where? And where in the world was his phone? And why couldn't he remember anything?

A phone started to ring.

He didn't recognize the ring. It wasn't his mobile. It came from a landline. A landline? When did he get one of those?

He sauntered over and picked up the phone hesitantly.

"Hello brother."

"Mycroft—"

"Before you start your grumbling, I need to explain a few things to you."

"Why would I need you to explain anything to me…"

"Do not try to convince me that you did not awake in a state of confusion, dear brother," he crooned.

Silence.

"Good then. I'll start at the beginning. You'll have realized when you awoke this morning that your memories felt a bit hazy."

He wasn't pacing anymore.

"I'll take your silence to mean that is the case. Last night you were arrested for public intoxication. I pulled a few strings and had you moved back to 221B. I also hired a nurse to make sure you didn't choke on your own vomit, but I'll tell him his services are no longer required?"

No answer.

"I take your silence to mean you are back to your old self. If you need me don't hesitate to call."

"Why would I need you?"

"Good day, Sherlock."

A click and then a dial tone.

He started pacing again. The explanation made little sense to him. Intoxication did not explain the mysterious file with his own handwriting inside of it or the blue dots. And it didn't explain why he couldn't remember anything before his supposed drunken rampage either.

So that begged the question: why would Mycroft lie

It was not the time to sit around and think. He gathered some hair and skin samples from the sofa and dashed off to the lab. He was going to piece together the puzzle.


End file.
